


Academy Blues

by jhoom



Series: Academy Blues [1]
Category: Mass Effect
Genre: F/M, Pre-Relationship, Roommates, college!au (sorta), military academy!au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-19
Updated: 2016-04-19
Packaged: 2018-06-03 06:53:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6601144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jhoom/pseuds/jhoom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mass Effect AU where promising young cadets from various planets are sent to train at a military academy.  And not just any academy, the academy.  Those that come out the other end of this grueling training are basically on the short-list for Spectre candidacy.  After years of being part of Citadel space, the first batch of human recruits are invited.  Among them is the young Jane Shepard, who has been part of the Alliance for just over a year.  </p><p>Based on this prompt: Today sucked. I’m so stressed out, I can’t make sense of anything, I have this horrible test tomorrow and I don’t know what happened but somehow I just broke down crying in front of you.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Academy Blues

**Author's Note:**

> For the original prompt [click here](http://selflessbellamy.tumblr.com/post/133186224821/a-list-of-roommates-aus) :)
> 
> lol I feel like the summary for this is probably way longer than the fic warrants. But i had so much to set up because there's so much bg info needed since I've made it kinda AU. This isn't so much Shakarian as possible pre-Shakarian or good friends Jane Shepard and Garrus Vakarian in the Mass Effect version of a college!au.
> 
> This is sort of an attempt at writing a short fic, I guess? In that I'm not planning out anything super long. I guess I'm hoping for less than two thousand tbh. (Even though as I wrote the summary I was like, damn this could be 10k no problem. But I need a fluffy ficlet dammit! Gotta counteract the sadness from writing The Mark - just a short oneshot to make it all better before I make it all worse haha.)
> 
> And last but not least, huge thank you to [Mordinette](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Mordinette/pseuds/Mordinette) who was my beta reader for this fic :)

Jane might only be 19, but she's had plenty of bad days.  There was the day her grandfather died when she was five.  That sucked.  Oh, and that one time she accidentally turned off the gravity on a shuttle her father was letting her pilot (both the actual incident and the tongue lashing she received later made this a particularly traumatic experience).  And let's not forget when she'd broken her arm in a stupid cargo bay accident and had to miss out on a class trip.  

And it's not as though those are the only examples of shit luck and bad days, either.  But those are her go to examples.  The ones she bitches about when people are telling stories and she needs to one up them.  'You think _that_  was bad, you should hear about-' types of situations you get into with new friends and fellow recruits.  

But today?  Today is worse than all of those put together.  

It starts when she fucks up setting up a handheld comm device.  It's a simulation of being stranded planet-side with non-functioning equipment.  A simple job of getting a signal out for backup.  Alliance training had her doing those all the time, the type of thing she feels she could do in her sleep.  And she seriously messes it up.

When she goes to open up the comm unit for parts, she's stumped for a minute.  The outside is the sleek casing that screams Alliance, but the inside looks nothing like what she expected.  There's a label on a piece that makes her think salarian, which, _fuck_.  But she figures she can make it work.

The damn thing just about explodes in her face.

And then the officer in charge of the simulation is chewing her out in front of the other recruits.  Okay, so she's been chewed out before.  This isn't exactly anything new.  But it makes her feel so _small_  to have this officer who _barely knows her_ insult her intelligence like that.  And the _guilt_  from the picture she paints in Jane's head.  Of being stranded with squad members depending on her training and expertise, and she'd just _blown up_  their only chance of contacting help.  

The whole thing puts her in a foul mood going to lunch.  Which is when her and the other recruits from the morning session find out that the impromptu humiliation she just endured has caused them to be late to the mess hall.  And it is now closed.  

They mutter to each other about how much of a dick their earlier instructor was before parting ways.  And she's probably just imagining the way a few of them glare at her.  

Her afternoon is filled with melee training.  Her head just isn't in it, her stomach growling uncomfortably and the water she keeps drinking sloshing around heavily.  She takes beating after beating.  And again, it's not that it isn't normally grueling work... it's just a lot worse when you get thrown onto a mat and aren't expecting it.

 _Get your head in the game, Shepard,_  she berates herself as she gets pinned _again_.

She's only too happy to hit the shower before storming off to her last session of the day.

Biotics.  Thank _god_.  Now this, _this_  is something she's good at.  She's hoping to just lose herself in the sparring matches and the cathartic effects of a good workout.

Yeah, not so much.  Not two moves into her first match, she's on her ass.  The next two bouts go better, followed by a tie.  

But then she's up against Vrogo, this small little thing of a krogan.  Definitely the smallest krogan you'll ever see.  But she learned the hard way that the guy could pack a fucking wallop.  Years of being the runt of the litter (and she can only imagine how bad that would be among krogan) had made him have something to prove.  A chip on his shoulder that results in him trying to smash every opponent into the ground.

The sad thing is, she _knew_  not to let her guard down around him.  She spars with him regularly and has more than her share of first hand experience with how strong his biotic throw is.  So when she gets hit by it three. times. _in a row._  she's just about had it.  

"Maybe you don't belong here," he sneers after the forth time.  It takes all of her willpower to not walk out right then.  

It’s his usual shit, the type of thing he says to everyone.  There's not a single recruit here he hasn't said something like that to.  But it still gets to her.  Worms her way under her skin and makes her want to smash something.

 _Does_  she belong here?  Is she good enough to be representing her whole _species_?  If she fucks up and gets herself kicked out, would it just be showing that humans aren't ready to train with the best of them?  Would it be the end of any human recruits period?

When they're dismissed to dinner, she just veers off to the dorms.  Yeah, she's really fucking hungry, but she just can't deal with being around anyone right now.  She's got snacks stashed in her foot locker, she'll be able to deal until breakfast.  Her body protests the way she sprints up the stairs to the third floor, bruises from her earlier beatings making themselves known, but otherwise it seems to relent to the forced fasting.

And to top it off, she stubs her goddamned toe on the way into her dorm room.

Murphy's law, amiright?

Somehow that's the last straw.  Her eyes water as she slams the console to close the door.  She ignores how that makes her hand sting because _of course_  it does.  She barely makes it to her bed before she's choking on tears, burying her face in her pillow and just letting the sobs take over.  

She's not sure how long she lies there crying.  All of her senses are shut down, everything narrowed to the way her body shakes with each breath and the growing wetness on her pillow.  It's no surprise that she doesn't hear the door open or the steps approaching.

"Shepard, I didn't see you at dinner-"  

Her breath hitches when she hears him and if possible her heart sinks even further.  Right.  Roommate.

"Garrus?" she asks.  Fuck her voice sounds raspy, even muffled by the bedding.  

They were assigned as roommates after a series of 'compatibility' tests at the beginning of the semester.  Roommates were supposed to be at a minimum from different planets, but ideally of different species.  Help build bridges between blah blah blah.  Jane was paired with the turian during her first week.  Their coursework generally doesn't line up, but they're still good friends.  And if pressed, she might be willing to admit she has a soft spot for the blue-eyed turian.

Just thinking that muddles her thoughts.  She feels her bed dip as he takes a seat next to her as she tries to focus around the fuzzy feeling in her chest.  

"Shepard?" he asks.  She can almost feel his hand hovering over her back, unsure how to offer comfort.

"'m fine," she mumbles.  It doesn't sound believable, so she turns her head so that she can actually see.  "I'm fine," she repeats and hopes she'll start to believe it herself.

She's not wrong about his hand.  It's a few inches above her, itching to rub between her shoulder blades, but now that she's turned her head he pulls it away.  "Are you sure?"

Her smile is a little weak, at least judging by the way his mandibles flutter in concern.  "I will be," she promises.  Because she will.  She sits up to prove her point.

Garrus moves over to make room for her when she swings her feet over the side of the bed.  They're sitting side by side, but it would be so easy to scoot over those last few inches so that their thighs would be touching.  Her leg tingles a little at the idea.  She sniffles a bit and wipes at her eyes, which seem to be mostly dry now but dammit if she doesn't need the distraction.  

"What happened?"

It's tempting to outright dismiss the question.  Shrug it off with a "Don't worry about it."  Maybe a "Nothing I can't handle" with a bit too much bravado.  She's about to say something along those lines but the words die in her throat.  She thinks about everything that happened and then she's hiccuping out, "Today _sucked_ -" but the rest of it's broken off into more sobs.  

She means to fling herself back onto the bed so she can hide how gross and miserable she looks while she cries, but Garrus is in the way and she kinda ends up throwing herself at him instead.  Her arms are around his neck, following the curve of his cowl, and her head rests on his shoulder as she struggles against this new wave of tears.  

The hesitance is back, his arms half raised to hug her back, but it doesn't last as long.  They close around her, strong and steady and she grounds herself in that feeling.  Her breathing evens out as she matches it to Garrus'.  Tension drains out of her until she feels like jelly, only still sitting because she's being held.  She even thinks she feels something rumbling in his chest.  

(Maybe his subvocals trying to soothe her?  There's something endearing and pretty adorable about that.

 _Ugh, do not think about Garrus being adorable._  

Scolding herself doesn't help, because the idea is there and she can't quite get rid of it.)

Enough time passes that she starts to realize that this is weird.  This is way too long to be a friendly hug (hell, she doesn't even know if turians hug _at all_ ).  She allows herself to soak in the centered feeling she's gained before she pulls away.  Shyly, she avoids looking Garrus in the eyes.  

"Sorry 'bout that."  She laughs slightly, because this is the type of thing you should laugh off, right?  Losing your shit in front of her roommate definitely is up there with embarrassing moments, and she'll be glad to have this behind them.  Though she doubts Garrus will tease her too much about it.

"Any time, Shepard."  One of his hands still rests on her left shoulder.  She can feel it, a solid weight that should feel invasive (the hug is over, after all) but doesn't in the least.  It makes her kinda sad to think that's not something she's ever had before.  Just a simple point of contact with the turian, easy and friendly ~~but potentially more.~~

She eventually follows the line of his arm up to his eyes, which are so intense and blue and fixed right at her.  They glimmer with something, some emotion that she can't quite place.  "You feeling better?" he asks.

It's a good thing they're not hugging anymore because there's no way she wouldn't have felt his voice rumbling through him.  She shivers a bit.

"Yeah," she says, because she needs to say something _now_  before she starts getting _ideas_.  "I think so."  She actually does, to her own surprise.  Thank god- she has a huge exam coming up that she needs to prep for (read: cram for) and being mopey isn't going to get her anywhere.  

With a final squeeze, he lets go and gets up.  She watches him retreat to his side of the room to start on his own studies.  The fuzziness is back, making her vision go a little soft.  

Huh.  She'll have to look into that later.  But for now she pulls out her notes, only sneaking a peak at Garrus once every couple minutes.  

Later, for sure.

**Author's Note:**

> I originally wanted this to be way more Shakarian than it ended up, but it didn't seem necessary to get these two smooching right now. Maybe at some point I'll revisit this and do a second part? We'll see! (Final word count *is* in fact less than 2000... but that's such a high word limit that it barely even counts as a "limit"...)


End file.
